Arabella Del Busso is served a brutal reality check by a judge as WAG makes extraordinary complaint about life as a TV star after being jailed

A judge has unleashed on former reality TV contestant and ex-footy WAG Arabella Del Busso after she pleaded to get out of jail early because of ‘brutal’ media attention.

The 33-year-old lingerie model appeared in court via video link from a western Sydney women’s prison on Wednesday, watching on as her lawyer argued she had been unfairly targeted by the media.

Del Busso – who only garnered a media profile after she famously lied to her ex-boyfriend, rugby league star Josh Reynolds, about being pregnant – was appealing against the severity of her 20 month jail sentence for stealing $52,000 from her employer.

The one-time SAS Australia contestant watched on in prison greens as her barrister, Jehane Ghabrial, complained that Del Busso had been the subject of ‘public humiliation’ from the media and argued for a suppression order.

But NSW District Court Judge John Pickering was having none of it – responding: ‘Being real about it, she’s pursued it. She put herself on a reality program. She put herself on national television. 

‘No-one forced her to go on SAS.’

In a lively exchange, which had Del Busso blinking rapidly as she listened in, Ms Ghabrial replied: ‘Just because somebody goes on national television doesn’t mean they are inviting [people] to tear their life apart …  it’s like having a wound continually open.’  

Judge Pickering disagreed. ‘That’s debatable,’ he said. ‘Isn’t that exactly what you you seek? 

‘In a case that’s dominating the media at the moment, in the case of Mr [Bruce] Lehrmann, that’s exactly what you get.

‘SAS… It’s the kind of show which people to seek to increase their profile. She has also sought to exploit it for her own profile.’

Ms Ghabrial: ‘It’s a matter that had nothing to do with Josh Reynolds. The media… keep dredging that up… the reporting is excessive about that.

Judge Pickering: ‘When you come to a criminal court there are aspects of your character that are assessed. 

‘The reality is these are dishonesty offences and there are aspects of that history which are dishonest.

‘We live in an Instagram, Twitter, TikTok world. Some people are private, some are public, some seek to continue… to [work on] their profile.’

His Honour will deliver his decision on Wednesday afternoon on whether to grant a reduction on Del Busso’s minimum 12-month sentence.

Her lawyers are pleading for a corrections order that would see Del Busso released from prison and serve her sentence in the community.

The court heard that on admission to prison, corrections authorities had immediately put her in a protection area – classifying  her as a ‘SMAP’ meaning Special Management Area Placement prisoner.

This classification is for inmates whose profile might attract unwanted attention or even attacks by other inmates.

Her barrister argued this was a further issue of being in jail, as the SMAP inmates could only go into the jail’s main yard during lunch hours. 

Daily Mail Australia has also learned the glamorous ex-WAG is leading prison yard fitness training with other women while locked up in the 531-inmate capacity Dillwynia Correctional Centre, in Sydney’s north-west.

Del Busso was jailed on February 13 for stealing $52,000 from Rheumatology Specialist Care, where she worked as a receptionist in its practices at Kogarah, in Sydney’s south, and Randwick, in the city’s east. 

She pleaded guilty to two counts of stealing as an employee between September 2019 and February 2020.

Magistrate Hugh Donnelly sentenced Del Busso to a minimum 12 months behind bars for what he described as an ‘appalling breach of trust’.

After spending a few nights at Silverwater Women’s Correctional Centre in Sydney’s west, she assigned to do her time at Dillwynia and transferred by prison van to the facility 56km outside of Sydney. 

Del Busso’s solicitor Andrew Stewart told Daily Mail Australia that Del Busso was hoping to get a sentence reduction as she was remorseful and is ‘trying to turn her life around’.

”It’s not to pleasant being in jail for anyone. She is trying to get as much support as possible,’ he said.

Del Busso has been adjusting to life in prison which includes spending about 17 hours each day in her three-metre by five-metre cell, prison meals served on a foil tray and associating with inmates serving time for violent offences.

However, it is understood that Del Busso is harnessing her expertise and fitness knowledge to keep herself trim and show the other inmates exercise routines.

‘She is doing what she can to help other inmates,’ Mr Stewart said. 

‘Keeping fit, helping inmates who have a number of issues, making sure you eat, making sure you shower.

‘She has expressed her remorse and has paid back what she was ordered to pay (about $30,000) from the money she saved up and was putting aside and prize money from boxing.’

On her arrival at Dillwynia, the sole female facility clustered with two male prisons in the Francis Greenway Correctional Complex, Del Busso was handed a pack including a toothbrush and toothpaste, soap, a plate, bowl and cup, and a roll of toilet paper.

Anything other than prison clothing is regarded as contraband. 

While inmates were once strip-searched on arrival, this usually only occurs now if a prison X-ray scanner identifies contraband hidden on an imate’s person.

Shown to her cell, which has only a thin, vinyl covered mattress, Del Busso was provided with a meal prepared at the adjacent male prison, the Geoffrey Pearce Correctional Centre.

Her meals have included pre-packaged salads with cold meat, and hot meals of crumbed fish, chicken wings and chicken schnitzel to be eaten with plastic cutlery.

Under the NSW prison system’s so-called Bangkok Rules, Del Busso has been encouraged to stay in contact with relatives or friends via weekly visits and calls via fixed telephone sin the jail’s common areas.

In addition, women inmates have access to a tablet device each day at afternoon lock-in, and are allowed outgoing calls from these devices until 10pm.

Under what is known as the Mandela Rules, Del Busso also has had access to confer with her legal advisers.

Mr Stewart said that Del Busso was seeking ‘a return to normalcy, back to working and her boxing career’ on her release from prison.

‘She’s definitely nervous (about her appeal) but she’s had time to reflect. She is sorry for it.’ 

The one-time glamour model gained notoriety after her relationship with then Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs NRL star Josh Reynolds dissolved when it became known she had faked a pregnancy.

In October 2020, she famously walked out of TV reality show SAS Australia after being interrogated about the relationship drama which had spilled into the public.